Larry Dunkeson oral history transcript

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1
INTERVIVEW WITH LARRY DUNKESON
BY JERRY FRENCH MAY 16, 2001
MR. FRENCH: This is an oral interview with Larry Dunkeson, in his home. Today is
May 16, 2001 and it is about a quarter to two in the afternoon. Larry, this is not a formal
thing. If you would care to just tell us your story, or any aspect of it. And tell us any of
your favorite parts of the Fish and Wildlife Service. You can begin with your schooling,
and your first assignment if you wish to.
MR. DUNKESON: O.K. It doesn’t seem possible, but when I retired, I retired with
thirty-three years in. That’s the part that doesn’t seem possible, because the thirty-three
years went by so quickly. And they were so enjoyable, and so memorable to me. I really
feel old when I think about the fact that I was in the Service for thirty-three years. I went
to school at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, New Mexico. I went down
there to study, I didn’t know what, for sure. But I looked at the Course Catalog for the
University, and there was a heading for Wildlife Management. And I said, “That’s it, I’m
gonna do it”. That’s what I studied during the years at New Mexico State. I graduated
with a bachelors in Wildlife Management. I didn’t know for sure what I was going to do,
although I went home and finished the requirements for a teaching certificate. Even
though I wasn’t sure I was going to do that. My wife was going to be a teacher and we
thought that it would be nice if we were both teachers. Before I actually graduated in
teaching, I got a call from my major professor, Dr. John Wood, who is now long gone.
He told me that a friend of mine from school had just quit his job in Albuquerque with
the Fish and Wildlife Service. He was working for what we then called, Predator and
Rodent Control. He told me that I might think about that. I did, I knew immediately that
I wanted to do that. So I called Albuquerque, which is two hundred miles away. I set up
an appointment to go interview with the director of the state Predator and Rodent Control
division. I went up to Albuquerque and interviewed him. What he wanted was someone
to go out and trap Coyotes, which was fine, except that I didn’t know anything about
trapping Coyotes. I knew what a Coyote looked like, and that’s about as far as it went.
He hired me anyway. They gave me an area to work in, and to run trap lines in. Most of
it was east of Albuquerque, where there were small ranchettes. The people were being
bothered because their pets were disappearing to Coyotes. So I went out and set up trap
lines, as I had been instructed to do, or in the manner in which I was instructed to do. I
didn’t catch anything! It was a long time before I finally caught my first Coyote. And I
was so proud of myself, even though the Coyote was dead, that I went into town,
Moriarty, for breakfast. I had that dead Coyote in the back of the International Scout that
I had been issued. I thought that people might ask me about that Coyote lying back there.
Nobody cared. All they really wanted to know was that it was dead. It’s gone. That was
an introduction. I staid with trapping Coyotes for about eight months, and pretty quickly
came to the decision that I didn’t want to spend my whole career trapping Coyotes, and
setting out “Coyote getters” which we used at that time. So I made a trip across the street
in downtown Albuquerque to interview with somebody, I didn’t care who, about maybe
getting over into Refuges. I wanted to spend some time in Refuges. As it turned out, the
first person I talked to was the lady who was in charge of the office. Her name was Mary
2
Bolivar. She is long gone now. I told her what I wanted. She led me to the back, down a
corridor to an office where I had never been before. And she introduced me to a man
who was at that time, the assistant regional supervisor for refuges. His name will be
familiar to most people. His name was Lynn Greenwalt. Later, he became the director of
the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. And Lynn was very nice to me. He interviewed me
and knew that I didn’t know a whole lot, because I had just gotten out of school. But, he
said, “Where in the U. S. would you like to go with Refuges, geographically”? I said, “It
doesn’t matter, I just want to get on a refuge”. He asked me what kind of refuge would I
like: migratory, breeding, or winter stopover. I told him that it didn’t matter. “I just
would like to get on a refuge”. He said asked me if I had any children. I told him, “No,
we haven’t been married too long. We’ve been in school we don’t have any children”.
He then said, “Well, I have a place for you”. Two weeks later, after lining up the moving
truck, my wife and I arrived at Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge, which is out on the
salt flats in Utah. It seemed like, at that time, a really godforsaken place, but it was a
refuge, and it didn’t matter to me. That’s what I wanted. An interesting story is that, on
the way in there, Fish Springs is a long ways from anyplace, and we drove, and drove,
and drove. Finally, we came around the last corner, and saw the headquarters. At that
point, my wife, Pat, thank goodness she’s here, burst into tears. And I don’t mean little
wet spots around her eyes. I mean alligator tears that ran down her cheeks! Her
comment was, “ I’m going back on ‘the Pill’ “. That was a good plan, but as I’ll tell you,
it didn’t work out. We were at Fish Springs. We had arrived at a refuge, and that’s what
I had wanted. That was the beginning of my career with Refuges. Of course, I was
already an employee with U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. From Fish Springs, we
traveled, literally, all over the country. If I can remember all of it, we went from Fish
Springs to Mackay Island in North Carolina. That was a long way. It was a big
adventure to go all the way across the country. From there, we went to Mason Neck in
Virginia. It becomes a blur after a while. At Mason Neck, I went into what used to be
called the Departmental Training Program. I think it’s called something else now, but I
was able to go through that. From there, I switched over to Ecological Services because
there was an opening in Ecological Services in Washington, state. I can’t think of the
town. Any way, it will come to me. We transferred out there to Olympia. That was it,
Olympia, Washington. We staid there for about two and a half years. That’s a beautiful
place, we enjoyed that assignment. After that, an opening came up at the Desert Game
Range, down in Las Vegas, Nevada. I applied for that. And I was able to get it. The
Desert Game Range, it was then called “Game Range”, it was so big. It was one and a
half million acres, much of which we couldn’t even get on, because it was a bombing and
gunnery range for the Air Force. A lot of it, we couldn’t even go on because there was
live ordinance lying around. We staid here for about a year and a half, then I had a
chance to transfer back into the Washington office. {D.C.] Which meant that we made
another move, back into Virginia. I worked in the Division of Refuges, there, in the
Washington office. I worked in the Division of Migratory Birds while I was there, also.
That was a good assignment. There was a lot of science going on there. It doesn’t sound
like it, but there was. From there, we had a chance to move, again, to Albuquerque,
which is where we started. We always thought that we would like to get back to
Albuquerque. I applied for the job, here in Albuquerque in the Division of Realty. I was
selected, and we moved back to Albuquerque. Our kids made one comment when we got
3
back to Albuquerque, after living in Washington, and seeing all that there is to see in
Washington. They said, “This is a nice place to live, there aren’t very many museums
here for us to see”. Although my youngest boy was somewhat afraid to move here,
because he was sure that he was going to be the “Anglo” in all of his classes. And that he
would have to wear a sombrero, like all of the other kids were probably wearing. He
found, when he got here, that this wasn’t the case. I staid in the Division of Realty, for
about fifteen years. Those were good years. I got to see a lot of country, and I got to
meet a lot of people. We bought a lot of dirt that eventually ended up in national wildlife
refuges. We even bought some land for fish hatcheries. Then, after being in Realty for
fifteen years, things changed. Supervisors changed, the job changed, and it became clear
to me that retirement was probably the next step I should take. And I did that. I retired
from the Fish and Wildlife Service in July of 2000, which is about, almost two years ago
now.
MR. FRENCH: It’s right at one year.
MR. DUNKESON: One year ago. Time flies when you’re having fun.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, you were, as I understand it, one of the first managers at Mason
Neck. Is that correct?
MR. DUNKESON: That is correct. I opened up Mason Neck.
MR. FRENCH: Would you care to discuss what it’s like to open a new refuge.
MR. DUNKESON: It’s difficult, because Mason Neck was established for the Bald
Eagle. It was established because of pressure from local residents who wanted that area
preserved. They used the Bald Eagle as their reason for preservation. I think that the
more overlying reason was because with a refuge established there, there wouldn’t be any
more building. Since they had homes out there, this would protect them [the residents]
from being overrun by Washington’s sprawl and people. They were taking care of
themselves. The refuge was established, and I did a lot of “kibitzing” with people, even
doing news stories with the local television stations. That was part of setting Mason
Neck up. The other part was getting out on the ground, and trying to see what it was that
we had out there. We established some trails. I put in a bridge over a ditch. In this part
of the country we call it an “unroyo”, but it was a ditch caused by the rain. Then the
refuge manager from Blackwater, whom I worked for, came over and saw that bridge, he
said, “No that won’t work because it’s too flimsy”. So I had to rebuild the bridge. And
as far as I know, that bridge is still there today. The trails are still there. We really didn’t
have any money, being a new refuge. I had enough money to buy gas for my used
pickup. I got a used pickup that was going to scrapped I think. That’s what I used to go
back and forth to Blackwater. We built a visitor contact station. And subsequently,
somebody who didn’t like the refuge got out there one night and burned it down. I got a
call from a local friend, and he said, “Larry, your refuge in on fire”! Which caused me a
lot of concern. So I ran out there, and the fire was out by that time. But that was the end
of that visitor contact station, which I think they have rebuilt since. Mason Neck has
4
been added to several times. Both by purchasing land that went into the refuge, and by
picking up excess land from the military that was added to the refuge, even though it was
disjoined from the refuge. Mason Neck gets a tremendous visitor visitation now, and it is
a very popular spot in the Washington area. In fact, from the refuge itself, you’d stand
out on the Potomac River, a lot of the refuge fronts on the Potomac River. If you look up
river on a clear day, you could see Mount Vernon. That gives an idea of where it is. It’s
right down the river from Mount Vernon.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, through your interview, you’ve worked with Animal Damage
Control, Refuges, Ecological Services, a tour in the Washington regional office. Would
you care to comment on these varied experiences? Your experience is certainly different
from what many of us have had. Many of us get in one place and stick there. You’ve
had the courage to venture out. Would you care to discuss how these things added to
themselves or possibly detracted?
MR. DUNKESON: That’s been one of the high points of my career. The chance to see a
lot of different places, and work on, not only refuges, but lands within the Fish and
Wildlife Service in different places. Our tour in North Carolina, which was at Mackay
Island National Wildlife Refuge, was a fun place to be. And it was interesting because of
the people who lived there. Many of which were descendents of the original settlers of
the Outer Banks who came in from England. They spoke with a very heavy early English
accent. Some of them, I couldn’t even understand. But I got to know them and became
friends with them. That was an advantage to moving around like we did, to all of the
different places. My children, who are now grown and have families of their own,
remember a lot of those places, even though they don’t remember exactly where they
were. They remember having been there. And they remember people from being there.
We moved a number of times. And that was back in the days when the Fish and Wildlife
Service had enough money to move people. It was an adventure for us. I would
recommend, having been through it, taking the opportunity to see all these different
places, and experience all these different locales. From Gettysburg, on to the Outer
Banks in North Carolina, to Olympia, Washington, which was a beautiful, and fun place.
Once you got used to the fact that in Olympia, no matter what you did, it was going to
rain. Once you accepted that, you were ok. My tours, and time in the Fish and Wildlife
Service have done a lot, I think, to broaden my perspective on life. It certainly it gave us
the chance to see a lot of places that we probably would not have seen otherwise.
MR. FRENCH: You’ve done a lot for my career. Long ago, you got me interested in
collecting old refuge signs. And I know that you have been interested in the heritage of
the Service for a long time. Would you care to expand on how you got interested in that
particular aspect of the career?
MR. DUNKESON: Well, beginning to gather old things happened pretty much at Mason
Neck. On the private land at Mason Neck, there were a lot of old trash piles, and outdoor
“johnnie” sites. We found that digging into an outdoor johnnie was a good place to find
old bottles. Many times, men would go out there, and drink in the outhouse, and drop the
bottle down the hole. Of course, over the years, all of that rotted, so it wasn’t a bad
5
experience. But there were a lot of trash piles on the private land, if you could find them.
Sometimes that was difficult, and sometimes it wasn’t. I started to collect old bottles out
there, and I got into an antique bottle club. That was fun for me because it provided me
with bottles from other members of the club. From then on, it was just a natural jump to
start collecting refuge boundary signs. Being in the Division of Realty, later in my
career, I was able to visit a lot of refuges. The people who worked there said, “We use to
have those old signs, and they’re still out there on posts. But they are all Interior
boundary signs”. They don’t do anything. They get shot at. So, occasionally, I would
pick up a boundary sign from an old refuge. The old refuge maintenance man always had
a pile of old signs somewhere, if you could just get him to remember, or admit where that
junk pile was. Every refuge has a bone yard and often times, the pile of old signs would
be down in the bone yard. They were not being used anymore, or they were outdated, or
whatever. They ended up being junked, down in the bone yard. After starting on old
bottles at Mason Neck, like I say, it was a natural jump to go to old signs. I collected
boundary signs for a long time. I had quite a full collection of metal signs, as far as I
knew. Those have all been donated to the Fish and Wildlife Museum, back in
Shepherdstown, West Virginia.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, I thank you very much. If there is anything that you care to add,
we’ll just kind of close this thing up. And for the benefit of the transcriber, my name is
Jerry French I failed to put that in at the first. That makes it easier for the transcriber to
know what’s going on. I appreciate very much your thoughts, and remembrances.
MR. DUNKESON: There is one thing that I’d like to point out. This just occurred to
me. And I think that Jerry will go along with it: We did so much moving around, and
each move was an adventure, and each move was strongly gone along with by my wife.
She wanted to see other parts of the country. And wanted to meet other people. For
those people who are still in the Fish and Wildlife Service, and who are in jobs that are
going to cause them to move around, or see different places, if you can find a life partner
who is also interested in doing that, and enjoys doing that. I would sure recommend it,
because it makes moving, and new jobs so much more enjoyable if you’ve got somebody
there to talk to, and who encourages you, and enjoys doing that.
MR. FRENCH: I can’t agree more with you. As my wife says, “We’ve never made a
bad move”. We lived in some strange houses. We got the kids in some strange schools.
It wasn’t until my daughter got into college that she said “This is the longest I’ve ever
staid in one school”. But we gained a great deal from it. The two daughters got to
“sample” more than just one community, and more than one way of life. O. K, Larry, I
thank you very much.
MR. DUNKESON: You are quite welcome. It was my pleasure.

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1
INTERVIVEW WITH LARRY DUNKESON
BY JERRY FRENCH MAY 16, 2001
MR. FRENCH: This is an oral interview with Larry Dunkeson, in his home. Today is
May 16, 2001 and it is about a quarter to two in the afternoon. Larry, this is not a formal
thing. If you would care to just tell us your story, or any aspect of it. And tell us any of
your favorite parts of the Fish and Wildlife Service. You can begin with your schooling,
and your first assignment if you wish to.
MR. DUNKESON: O.K. It doesn’t seem possible, but when I retired, I retired with
thirty-three years in. That’s the part that doesn’t seem possible, because the thirty-three
years went by so quickly. And they were so enjoyable, and so memorable to me. I really
feel old when I think about the fact that I was in the Service for thirty-three years. I went
to school at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, New Mexico. I went down
there to study, I didn’t know what, for sure. But I looked at the Course Catalog for the
University, and there was a heading for Wildlife Management. And I said, “That’s it, I’m
gonna do it”. That’s what I studied during the years at New Mexico State. I graduated
with a bachelors in Wildlife Management. I didn’t know for sure what I was going to do,
although I went home and finished the requirements for a teaching certificate. Even
though I wasn’t sure I was going to do that. My wife was going to be a teacher and we
thought that it would be nice if we were both teachers. Before I actually graduated in
teaching, I got a call from my major professor, Dr. John Wood, who is now long gone.
He told me that a friend of mine from school had just quit his job in Albuquerque with
the Fish and Wildlife Service. He was working for what we then called, Predator and
Rodent Control. He told me that I might think about that. I did, I knew immediately that
I wanted to do that. So I called Albuquerque, which is two hundred miles away. I set up
an appointment to go interview with the director of the state Predator and Rodent Control
division. I went up to Albuquerque and interviewed him. What he wanted was someone
to go out and trap Coyotes, which was fine, except that I didn’t know anything about
trapping Coyotes. I knew what a Coyote looked like, and that’s about as far as it went.
He hired me anyway. They gave me an area to work in, and to run trap lines in. Most of
it was east of Albuquerque, where there were small ranchettes. The people were being
bothered because their pets were disappearing to Coyotes. So I went out and set up trap
lines, as I had been instructed to do, or in the manner in which I was instructed to do. I
didn’t catch anything! It was a long time before I finally caught my first Coyote. And I
was so proud of myself, even though the Coyote was dead, that I went into town,
Moriarty, for breakfast. I had that dead Coyote in the back of the International Scout that
I had been issued. I thought that people might ask me about that Coyote lying back there.
Nobody cared. All they really wanted to know was that it was dead. It’s gone. That was
an introduction. I staid with trapping Coyotes for about eight months, and pretty quickly
came to the decision that I didn’t want to spend my whole career trapping Coyotes, and
setting out “Coyote getters” which we used at that time. So I made a trip across the street
in downtown Albuquerque to interview with somebody, I didn’t care who, about maybe
getting over into Refuges. I wanted to spend some time in Refuges. As it turned out, the
first person I talked to was the lady who was in charge of the office. Her name was Mary
2
Bolivar. She is long gone now. I told her what I wanted. She led me to the back, down a
corridor to an office where I had never been before. And she introduced me to a man
who was at that time, the assistant regional supervisor for refuges. His name will be
familiar to most people. His name was Lynn Greenwalt. Later, he became the director of
the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. And Lynn was very nice to me. He interviewed me
and knew that I didn’t know a whole lot, because I had just gotten out of school. But, he
said, “Where in the U. S. would you like to go with Refuges, geographically”? I said, “It
doesn’t matter, I just want to get on a refuge”. He asked me what kind of refuge would I
like: migratory, breeding, or winter stopover. I told him that it didn’t matter. “I just
would like to get on a refuge”. He said asked me if I had any children. I told him, “No,
we haven’t been married too long. We’ve been in school we don’t have any children”.
He then said, “Well, I have a place for you”. Two weeks later, after lining up the moving
truck, my wife and I arrived at Fish Springs National Wildlife Refuge, which is out on the
salt flats in Utah. It seemed like, at that time, a really godforsaken place, but it was a
refuge, and it didn’t matter to me. That’s what I wanted. An interesting story is that, on
the way in there, Fish Springs is a long ways from anyplace, and we drove, and drove,
and drove. Finally, we came around the last corner, and saw the headquarters. At that
point, my wife, Pat, thank goodness she’s here, burst into tears. And I don’t mean little
wet spots around her eyes. I mean alligator tears that ran down her cheeks! Her
comment was, “ I’m going back on ‘the Pill’ “. That was a good plan, but as I’ll tell you,
it didn’t work out. We were at Fish Springs. We had arrived at a refuge, and that’s what
I had wanted. That was the beginning of my career with Refuges. Of course, I was
already an employee with U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. From Fish Springs, we
traveled, literally, all over the country. If I can remember all of it, we went from Fish
Springs to Mackay Island in North Carolina. That was a long way. It was a big
adventure to go all the way across the country. From there, we went to Mason Neck in
Virginia. It becomes a blur after a while. At Mason Neck, I went into what used to be
called the Departmental Training Program. I think it’s called something else now, but I
was able to go through that. From there, I switched over to Ecological Services because
there was an opening in Ecological Services in Washington, state. I can’t think of the
town. Any way, it will come to me. We transferred out there to Olympia. That was it,
Olympia, Washington. We staid there for about two and a half years. That’s a beautiful
place, we enjoyed that assignment. After that, an opening came up at the Desert Game
Range, down in Las Vegas, Nevada. I applied for that. And I was able to get it. The
Desert Game Range, it was then called “Game Range”, it was so big. It was one and a
half million acres, much of which we couldn’t even get on, because it was a bombing and
gunnery range for the Air Force. A lot of it, we couldn’t even go on because there was
live ordinance lying around. We staid here for about a year and a half, then I had a
chance to transfer back into the Washington office. {D.C.] Which meant that we made
another move, back into Virginia. I worked in the Division of Refuges, there, in the
Washington office. I worked in the Division of Migratory Birds while I was there, also.
That was a good assignment. There was a lot of science going on there. It doesn’t sound
like it, but there was. From there, we had a chance to move, again, to Albuquerque,
which is where we started. We always thought that we would like to get back to
Albuquerque. I applied for the job, here in Albuquerque in the Division of Realty. I was
selected, and we moved back to Albuquerque. Our kids made one comment when we got
3
back to Albuquerque, after living in Washington, and seeing all that there is to see in
Washington. They said, “This is a nice place to live, there aren’t very many museums
here for us to see”. Although my youngest boy was somewhat afraid to move here,
because he was sure that he was going to be the “Anglo” in all of his classes. And that he
would have to wear a sombrero, like all of the other kids were probably wearing. He
found, when he got here, that this wasn’t the case. I staid in the Division of Realty, for
about fifteen years. Those were good years. I got to see a lot of country, and I got to
meet a lot of people. We bought a lot of dirt that eventually ended up in national wildlife
refuges. We even bought some land for fish hatcheries. Then, after being in Realty for
fifteen years, things changed. Supervisors changed, the job changed, and it became clear
to me that retirement was probably the next step I should take. And I did that. I retired
from the Fish and Wildlife Service in July of 2000, which is about, almost two years ago
now.
MR. FRENCH: It’s right at one year.
MR. DUNKESON: One year ago. Time flies when you’re having fun.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, you were, as I understand it, one of the first managers at Mason
Neck. Is that correct?
MR. DUNKESON: That is correct. I opened up Mason Neck.
MR. FRENCH: Would you care to discuss what it’s like to open a new refuge.
MR. DUNKESON: It’s difficult, because Mason Neck was established for the Bald
Eagle. It was established because of pressure from local residents who wanted that area
preserved. They used the Bald Eagle as their reason for preservation. I think that the
more overlying reason was because with a refuge established there, there wouldn’t be any
more building. Since they had homes out there, this would protect them [the residents]
from being overrun by Washington’s sprawl and people. They were taking care of
themselves. The refuge was established, and I did a lot of “kibitzing” with people, even
doing news stories with the local television stations. That was part of setting Mason
Neck up. The other part was getting out on the ground, and trying to see what it was that
we had out there. We established some trails. I put in a bridge over a ditch. In this part
of the country we call it an “unroyo”, but it was a ditch caused by the rain. Then the
refuge manager from Blackwater, whom I worked for, came over and saw that bridge, he
said, “No that won’t work because it’s too flimsy”. So I had to rebuild the bridge. And
as far as I know, that bridge is still there today. The trails are still there. We really didn’t
have any money, being a new refuge. I had enough money to buy gas for my used
pickup. I got a used pickup that was going to scrapped I think. That’s what I used to go
back and forth to Blackwater. We built a visitor contact station. And subsequently,
somebody who didn’t like the refuge got out there one night and burned it down. I got a
call from a local friend, and he said, “Larry, your refuge in on fire”! Which caused me a
lot of concern. So I ran out there, and the fire was out by that time. But that was the end
of that visitor contact station, which I think they have rebuilt since. Mason Neck has
4
been added to several times. Both by purchasing land that went into the refuge, and by
picking up excess land from the military that was added to the refuge, even though it was
disjoined from the refuge. Mason Neck gets a tremendous visitor visitation now, and it is
a very popular spot in the Washington area. In fact, from the refuge itself, you’d stand
out on the Potomac River, a lot of the refuge fronts on the Potomac River. If you look up
river on a clear day, you could see Mount Vernon. That gives an idea of where it is. It’s
right down the river from Mount Vernon.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, through your interview, you’ve worked with Animal Damage
Control, Refuges, Ecological Services, a tour in the Washington regional office. Would
you care to comment on these varied experiences? Your experience is certainly different
from what many of us have had. Many of us get in one place and stick there. You’ve
had the courage to venture out. Would you care to discuss how these things added to
themselves or possibly detracted?
MR. DUNKESON: That’s been one of the high points of my career. The chance to see a
lot of different places, and work on, not only refuges, but lands within the Fish and
Wildlife Service in different places. Our tour in North Carolina, which was at Mackay
Island National Wildlife Refuge, was a fun place to be. And it was interesting because of
the people who lived there. Many of which were descendents of the original settlers of
the Outer Banks who came in from England. They spoke with a very heavy early English
accent. Some of them, I couldn’t even understand. But I got to know them and became
friends with them. That was an advantage to moving around like we did, to all of the
different places. My children, who are now grown and have families of their own,
remember a lot of those places, even though they don’t remember exactly where they
were. They remember having been there. And they remember people from being there.
We moved a number of times. And that was back in the days when the Fish and Wildlife
Service had enough money to move people. It was an adventure for us. I would
recommend, having been through it, taking the opportunity to see all these different
places, and experience all these different locales. From Gettysburg, on to the Outer
Banks in North Carolina, to Olympia, Washington, which was a beautiful, and fun place.
Once you got used to the fact that in Olympia, no matter what you did, it was going to
rain. Once you accepted that, you were ok. My tours, and time in the Fish and Wildlife
Service have done a lot, I think, to broaden my perspective on life. It certainly it gave us
the chance to see a lot of places that we probably would not have seen otherwise.
MR. FRENCH: You’ve done a lot for my career. Long ago, you got me interested in
collecting old refuge signs. And I know that you have been interested in the heritage of
the Service for a long time. Would you care to expand on how you got interested in that
particular aspect of the career?
MR. DUNKESON: Well, beginning to gather old things happened pretty much at Mason
Neck. On the private land at Mason Neck, there were a lot of old trash piles, and outdoor
“johnnie” sites. We found that digging into an outdoor johnnie was a good place to find
old bottles. Many times, men would go out there, and drink in the outhouse, and drop the
bottle down the hole. Of course, over the years, all of that rotted, so it wasn’t a bad
5
experience. But there were a lot of trash piles on the private land, if you could find them.
Sometimes that was difficult, and sometimes it wasn’t. I started to collect old bottles out
there, and I got into an antique bottle club. That was fun for me because it provided me
with bottles from other members of the club. From then on, it was just a natural jump to
start collecting refuge boundary signs. Being in the Division of Realty, later in my
career, I was able to visit a lot of refuges. The people who worked there said, “We use to
have those old signs, and they’re still out there on posts. But they are all Interior
boundary signs”. They don’t do anything. They get shot at. So, occasionally, I would
pick up a boundary sign from an old refuge. The old refuge maintenance man always had
a pile of old signs somewhere, if you could just get him to remember, or admit where that
junk pile was. Every refuge has a bone yard and often times, the pile of old signs would
be down in the bone yard. They were not being used anymore, or they were outdated, or
whatever. They ended up being junked, down in the bone yard. After starting on old
bottles at Mason Neck, like I say, it was a natural jump to go to old signs. I collected
boundary signs for a long time. I had quite a full collection of metal signs, as far as I
knew. Those have all been donated to the Fish and Wildlife Museum, back in
Shepherdstown, West Virginia.
MR. FRENCH: Larry, I thank you very much. If there is anything that you care to add,
we’ll just kind of close this thing up. And for the benefit of the transcriber, my name is
Jerry French I failed to put that in at the first. That makes it easier for the transcriber to
know what’s going on. I appreciate very much your thoughts, and remembrances.
MR. DUNKESON: There is one thing that I’d like to point out. This just occurred to
me. And I think that Jerry will go along with it: We did so much moving around, and
each move was an adventure, and each move was strongly gone along with by my wife.
She wanted to see other parts of the country. And wanted to meet other people. For
those people who are still in the Fish and Wildlife Service, and who are in jobs that are
going to cause them to move around, or see different places, if you can find a life partner
who is also interested in doing that, and enjoys doing that. I would sure recommend it,
because it makes moving, and new jobs so much more enjoyable if you’ve got somebody
there to talk to, and who encourages you, and enjoys doing that.
MR. FRENCH: I can’t agree more with you. As my wife says, “We’ve never made a
bad move”. We lived in some strange houses. We got the kids in some strange schools.
It wasn’t until my daughter got into college that she said “This is the longest I’ve ever
staid in one school”. But we gained a great deal from it. The two daughters got to
“sample” more than just one community, and more than one way of life. O. K, Larry, I
thank you very much.
MR. DUNKESON: You are quite welcome. It was my pleasure.